Genealogy

GENEALOGY

People sometimes ask me whether we have any movie stars, sports stars, or other celebrities in our 1960 class, and I have to say that I don't think we do. However, one of our classmates can point to a number of "especially interesting people" in his own family. Here's something to inspire all of you genealogy buffs:

GENEALOGY

Lawrence Robinsonshares the results of his ongoing genealogy research:

About ten years ago I became interested in genealogy. My guess was that my mother’s line would be very interesting, to say the least. That’s why I chose to do what I felt would be the easier and faster of the two lines—my father’s. After spending eight years investigating, digging into, and researching his line, it became apparent that he, not she, was the more interesting.

My family tree is currently on “ancestry.com” and contains 7,260 family members, 1,306 photos, 263 stories, and 3,399 records. There are now 14,200 hints to be followed up on. I suppose that means that if I live to be 120 years old, I’ll be able to research them. It also means that I will be able to trace my father’s direct line well past 940 AD, which is where I left off.

Aside from the online tree, I amassed 12 volumes along with a book entitled The Stricklands of Sizergh Castle by Daniel Scott.

(This is a picture of 14th-century Sizergh Castle in northern England.)

In addition to my own, I needed six copies to distribute to my siblings. One might think I went all out by making wooden mini book boxes for each set; (...and I did; handles, hardware etc.). It is so gratifying to find out what came before me. The search was a main part of the pleasure. However, after documenting my direct paternal line, the greatest joy was to find the Strickland book and find out that my own research matched it to a tee.

Over the years I’ve had people exclaim that they were related to Alexander the Great, Joan of Arc, Mickey Mouse etc. Well, to my surprise, I now join with them. Seems as though Mary Ball Washington (George’s mother) became the second wife of Augustine Washington (George’s father). Her mother was a Strickland.

Here's a photo ofMary Ball Washington (mother of George Washington)

Furthermore, there’s a connection to Catherine Parr, who was Queen of England and Ireland (1543–47).

She was the last and only surviving wife of the six wives of King Henry VIII, and the final queen consort of the House of Tudor. She was also a Strickland by way of her father’s mother. Catherine Parr might have been the first liberal feminist. She married four times, wrote published books, was fluent in French, Latin, Spanish and Italian, was a documented cougar, and had a yearly pension amounting to what would be over 7 million dollars in today’s money. At the age of 35 (one year after Henry’s death), Catherine became pregnant for the first known time. All of this by the age of 36, when she died in childbirth.

It’s my aspiration to find the time in the future to trace back beyond Anno Domini... It seems the further back I research, the easier it becomes. I would recommend that everyone research their family genealogy... it’s better than your best birthday present.

Jack Brighamwrites, "I have been interested in our Brigham family history/ genealogy for many years and have put together a 'book' of my research findings ... about 180 pages long." Jack's history covers 16 family lines for five generationsfocusing closely on the Brigham line. In a section called “especially interesting people,” Jack describes his family's links to the 14th-century King Edward III of England, Mary Boleyn ("mistress of kings" and sister of Anne Boleyn - 2nd wife of Henry VIII), Stephen Bachiler (a Puritan pastor and religious maverick), three ancestors who came over on the Mayflower in 1620 including Pilgrim William Brewster (whom we read about long ago in US history class), Quakers who supported victims of the Salem Witch Trials, plus many more interesting characters.

Jack's ancestors, King Edward III of England (1327-1377) and William Brewster of Plymouth, Massachusetts (1560-1644)

Jack's chronicle includes pedigree charts of family lines, maps, and tables that place his ancestors within the context of historical events in England and in the American colonies. There are lots of photographs of Jack and his sister and brothers growing up in Montclair. He also uses photos and stories to document the family life of his mother and father as young people. Lists of sources and a bibliography are included. Jack's next step on this "work in progress" will trace even more of his 1700 direct ancestors, going even farther back to those alive in the 1300s and earlier.If you are curious and want to take a look at Jack's history, the url below shouldenable you to see and download the whole “book.”

Here are Jack's instructions: To access, click on the url above to get to it in Google Docs. Then click on the download button on the upper right (down arrow) so it will download. When it finishes downloading (you can check via the spinning circle at the bottom of page 1), it may say, “Whoops! There was a problem downloading more pages.” Ignore that message and click on the box with the Word logo in the lower left corner of the screen. Mine says in that box, “Draft 4 Digital-5a … docx”. Your system might say something slightly different. That should download it into Word and then you can Save it. If this doesn’t work for you, you can contact Jack at brigham@psy.fsu.edu.

A final word from Jack: "I might mention, for any newbie genealogy wannabes, research is so much easier today than it was in the 1980s or 1990s. As in so many things, the internet has had a huge impact. Today, if you have the name and birth year of an ancestor born before 1900 or so, you can simply type it into Google and often it sends you to one or more genealogy websites that have that information on this person and often on her/his ancestors as well."

Jack's ancestors, King Edward III of England (1327-1377) and William Brewster of Plymouth, Massachusetts (1560-1644)

Jack's chronicle includes pedigree charts of family lines, maps, and tables that place his ancestors within the context of historical events in England and in the American colonies. There are lots of photographs of Jack and his sister and brothers growing up in Montclair. He also uses photos and stories to document the family life of his mother and father as young people. Lists of sources and a bibliography are included. Jack's next step on this "work in progress" will trace even more of his 1700 direct ancestors, going even farther back to those alive in the 1300s and earlier.If you are curious and want to take a look at Jack's history, the url below shouldenable you to see and download the whole “book.”

Here are Jack's instructions: To access, click on the url above to get to it in Google Docs. Then click on the download button on the upper right (down arrow) so it will download. When it finishes downloading (you can check via the spinning circle at the bottom of page 1), it may say, “Whoops! There was a problem downloading more pages.” Ignore that message and click on the box with the Word logo in the lower left corner of the screen. Mine says in that box, “Draft 4 Digital-5a … docx”. Your system might say something slightly different. That should download it into Word and then you can Save it. If this doesn’t work for you, you can contact Jack at brigham@psy.fsu.edu.

A final word from Jack: "I might mention, for any newbie genealogy wannabes, research is so much easier today than it was in the 1980s or 1990s. As in so many things, the internet has had a huge impact. Today, if you have the name and birth year of an ancestor born before 1900 or so, you can simply type it into Google and often it sends you to one or more genealogy websites that have that information on this person and often on her/his ancestors as well."

Ralph Davidson's Story

In our last MHS '60 update, Jack Brigham wrote about his ambitious geneology project and the stories that he has discovered about his ancestors. (See Jack's story farther down on this page.) Now Ralph Davidson is sharing his story.

Ralph writes, "I have been into genealogy and family history since retirement 11 years ago. I have written hundreds of pages for my family and others. A lot of great stories. Elizabeth (Libbie) Bacon Custer (wife of General Armstrong Custer) is my one claim to 'celebrity fame.'

An online website says, "George and Libbie Custer made a handsome and glamorous couple."

I researched an ancestor from the American Revolution. I succeeded in gathering all the evidence needed for proving to the DAR our family descendency (from one 'Eljah Ward') to make it possible for for my sisters, 1st cousin, and female children of all to be eligible. My sister, Joan, is now in a very large DAR chapter in the Philadelphia area.

My approach to studying family history is different from what others often do. There are those who go after large amounts of data in order to find as many people as possible. They like elaborate trees and lists. My goal is to dig for interesting stories. I frequently use lineage lines in my writings but not large trees. Readers understand much better about their ancestry with this approach. My goal is to make history interesting.